In what was described as a “significant milestone,” dignitaries, staff and residents signed the Pioneer Manor bed redevelopment project’s final structural beam on Tuesday.
This final piece of steel will be installed at the top of the building’s sixth floor, city Long-Term Care Services director Aaron Archibald told Sudbury.com following a photo-op.
The $93-million Pioneer Manor bed redevelopment project remains on-budget and on-track to open by mid-2026, he said. It’s slated to be weather-tight by the end of the year, with crews composed mainly of local hires working their way through the building’s interior.
M. Sullivan & Son Ltd. is the contractor and Sudbury-based Bélanger Salach Architecture designed the 160-room project.
Bélanger Salach Architecture partner and architect Amber Salache told Sudbury.com that the project has been anything but run-of-the-mill.
“Not straightforward at all,” she said, crediting the city and contractors with helping them achieve strict provincial Ministry of Long-Term Care deadlines.
The design itself exceeds ministry minimums when it comes to residents per home unit, at 16 to the province’s maximum of 32.
“We did a lot of work thinking about accessibility and the older-adult community and how they maneuver through space, how they perceive space,” she said, adding that with smaller home units they were able to create “a circulation core that allows residents to meander and not end up at a dead-end wall.”
This can make walking through the building less confusing to residents with such things as dementia, she said, and “allows residents the ability to circulate freely and comfortably.”
Although the building’s new wing is six storeys in total, only the first five will be habitable, with the top floor eaten up by electrical and mechanical components.
The new wing’s 160 rooms will replace an existing wing which was built in the early 1970s, and has 149 beds in 90 rooms. This yields a net gain of 11 beds.
Whereas the older section residents will eventually vacate has shared rooms and four people per bathroom, the new space will have private bedrooms, of which 100 have a private bathroom and 60 have two people per shared bathroom.
The city is in discussions with prospective tenants for the wing which will be vacated when the bed redevelopment project is completed. The vacated space would be filled to meet community needs and “enhance the campus” at Pioneer Manor and generate revenue, Archibald said.
Community advocate and past city council member and mayoral candidate Evelyn Dutrisac has been advocating for at least part of the space to be filled out by shared residential accommodations for seniors under the Abbeyfield model.
The $93-million project includes $76.2 million from the province toward its hard construction cost of approximately $80.4 million, which will be paid to the city over the course of 25 years. All-in, including such costs as equipment and furniture which aren’t covered by the province, the project’s total city council-approved budget is $93 million.
Tyler Clarke covers city hall and political affairs for Sudbury.com.
